I got the bike back from the shop today. They did a "safety" inspection for me. I had already done mine, looking over every inch of the bike including the steerer tube. So, hopefully it's all set to go.I decided to change out my carbon bars, kind of because I've had carbon bars break on me before, and kind of because I didn't like the bend in the drops and because the drop was 147mm. I put on the white FSA compact wing pro bars. I had these previously, but the size 42cm, was too skinny. These 44cm ones are perfect. I really like the drop bend and it's a lot more comfortable to have my fingers on the brake levers when I'm in the drops.
I don't have the white FSA stem (that matches the bars exactly) on anymore though. With the change in bars I had to increase the reach by using a 120mm stem instead of the 110mm one I had on. I bought this stem off of JW last year and up until about a month ago, I thought it was lost in the move.
I think I went into this on a previous post, but it's a little annoying that all the different manufacturers have different ways of measuring things. I'm convinced Specialized can't measure reach on handlebars. Mine were listed at 79mm. The new FSA bars I just put on were listed at 80mm. I measured the FSA...got 80mm, I measured the Specialized the same way...100mm...idiotic.
Before I switched out the bars I measured from the front of my saddle to a point on top of the brake hood to get an idea of what the real change in reach would be since I knew my front of saddle to middle of bars would increase by 10mm with the longer stem.
The net result of putting on a 10mm longer stem and a bar that was listed at 1mm more reach than my old bars was an actual decrease of 10mm (1cm) of reach to the hoods. It works though. The guy doing my retul fit said I was just a tad too bent over from the optimal angle, so a little less reach is not a bad thing.
I'm just rambling and I'm sure all these measurements and nitpicking might seem lame (hence the name of the blog) or not a big deal, but I guess it's a combination of a me thing and a cycling thing.
Gotta see if this low-grade headache I've had since, hmmmm....last Sunday gets any better tomorrow. If not, I'm off to see the Doc.
4 comments:
chris, that white tape looks infinitely better than the green. I'm personally a fan of green but that stuff was rough looking, however it did make it alot easier to pick you out of the pack with the green tape and yellow shoes
Just found out about the crash. Glad you are ok.
I really like the new white tape. It's a nice combo with the white bar and black stem, not to mention it feels a ton better when I'm in the drops. The shape of the Ritchey stem and the fact that its a centimeter longer allowed me to move my computer forward a bit from where it was before, so it's easier to see. Nothing but good changes. I think the neon yellow shoes should do the trick of picking me out in a crowd, no green tape needed.
Joel, thanks, appreciate it. Everything is healing up just fine, not really sore anymore except a bit in my neck and a slight headache.
Glad to hear you're doing alright and you'll be back with the us ncvc boys at Syn-Fit/Dolan weekend.
And I agree with Wick. The white looks so much better. That is one hot bike.
Post a Comment